I was wondering if anyone here believes in life after death? If so would you care to share why or why not?

I just want this settled within myself so i am not thinking about it so much...

Up until October 2011, i never questioned there is a soul, whatever, that moves on.

THEN my son killed himself. It was devastating of course. ... But so final. And really empty. Since he has been dead, there has just been nothing what so ever. Seen the place he died (walked into his friends house and did so, the family let me come there about 3 weeks later). I went in and they even left me alone for a time, and nothing. I thought maybe i would feel some trace, but i did not. Been to the burial site once, but still, he s just not there... That's why i never went back.

My grandma died Aug 5. Her and i were very close. They raised me mostly, and then her and i were like best friends until dementia got her a year ago. Same with her. Nothing. .. Just like my son... no dreams, no "ghosts", no smelling their familiar scents... not a damn thing.

I conclude regularly that there is nothing beyond this. We live, the unexpected sometimes happen, and then we die. And it is final.....

EXCEPT i get tripped up on that when i remember my childrens father. 16 months after my oldest son died, he did the same thing. But in his bedroom. Died the same way as my oldest.

He and his family were horribly strained so it ended up left to me to clear his place out after death. It took many days because he never threw anything away... One night i was there late and called my aunt just for a break, and during our talk she tried to lighten things up by telling me a funny story of someone we know.....

Just after i started laughing there was this horrid feeling of anger in the room almost MOVING,, toward ME. I looked direction of hallway cause it was almost like someone was there walking fast toward where i was in the kitchen. But i was alone... This was so strong that i said to my aunt "I have to go", and i ran out the house. Didn't even stop to lock the door behind me, i didn't care, i ran to my car and to the hotel i was staying at. After that i didn't go in and finish the job myself. I asked for help but didn't ever tell anyone why.

^^^ that is no proof of anything tho. Cause i didn't see anything whatever BUT it was as real as someone in person running at you while they are really pissed off, and i will never forget that feeling.

But i was wondering on other people's thoughts on this subject and why?

There are many questions raised about what goes on and what does not. Living here and now, we can see that everything is transient. Your son was not the same one day from the next, so what would be that which would endure? If we think about what is permanent, what would that be? Even our ideas about ourselves, if studied closely, are fluid, and can be seen to just be a way of looking at this experience of life in the moment. The body starts out as a needy infant and begins changing quickly into what will possibly become the shell of someone expiring of dementia. So, it's a safe bet we aren't these bodies.

We are not what we think, and nothing is. Thoughts are the most fleeting of things, made of no substance whatsoever. This kind of understanding is the domain of the mind; such a changeable entity as to be even less what we actually are than these temporary bodies. But something is here, knowing in the present instant awareness that it is. What is that? That awareness was the first thing, before any idea of a personal identity. This, I believe I can say, is what will, and what does, go on. This being the awareness itself is something I can be happy with, and needing nothing else, why I am happy for no reason. If I were to look to a memory of the experiences of life, from the viewpoint of my character in this play of it all, there will be every reason, every thought, feeling, and emotion, and the judgments about this, the regrets about that.

Knowing I am not really that made up character, in light of its impermanence, I know peace. The personal entity I have been playing wanted to connect with my mother when she passed. Was it for her, my idea of her, or just for my idea of myself?

I once had a visit in meditation from a friend who had been killed instantly in a head-on crash. It was just one word, in his familiar voice, but it told me he was okay, and enduring in some fashion. My father was killed the same way, three miles from where my friend was killed, and I never had another inkling of him, as who he seemed to be. My friend's mother took a two year dive into an unreality of refusing to admit her son was dead, to the point of talking of little else but the return of Tony any day now, keeping all his stuff and obsessing. When I told her of the one word I had heard from Tony, a switch in her mind was flipped, and she returned to living a normal life. I assume that Tony could not get through to her, didn't want her to continue her suffering, so that was why he came to my consciousness in that way. But, really, I don't know.

When I told her of the one word I had heard from Tony, a switch in her mind was flipped, and she returned to living a normal life.

And that one word was, "Swordfish", so now rest in peace.

I see things a little differently from Alder. There is a fundamental problem with the concept that "We" exist or are uniquely alive in the first place, It is a problem of scale or levels of perception. The "Me" that exists is actually a huge collection of functioning living parts, including cells, and in fact bacteria by the millions. Each can be said to be alive individually, so the "me" that exists is really a city of individual lives.

On another level the "me" that exists is just a functioning part of a larger whole, contributing to the function of that species, or country, religion, family, clan or club. Think of an apiary, a bee yard. Each hive has a unique character and is in a sense alive but it is also just an ensemble of individual bees. Each bee is an ensemble of bacteria and cells.

So once we define the sense in which we exist then the answer as to whether or not that remains after death becomes easier to solve. The paradox occurs when we change the definition of the "me" that is "alive" half way through the analysis.

The "me that is "alive" does in some way terminally cease to exist when we die. But it is equally true that I can become conspicuous by my absence as part of the whole to which I was a part. A ghost is simply something that is conspicuous by it's absence.

The troubles of your son and husband are not maintained as part of any afterlife, because those troubles simply do not apply outside of the context that they had in their "lives". Once the context is removed the troubles simply evaporate.

I will not have my favorite dog or wife or swimming hole in an afterlife. The Mormons are mistaken, we do not get our own planet to populate with our wife in an afterlife, and there are no 72 virgins and 72 additional mothers-in-law to deal with after we are martyred.

Define your thoughts precisely and many questions manifest an obvious answer. What do we mean by "life", or "me", or "exist" in the original sense of the question? My maternal grandfather still exists as part of me, while to the rest of the world he died when I was 3 years old.

I appreciate and respect the way you present ideas here Camirea, and feel certain that there is an answer that fits your life, just as there is an answer for Alder, and one for me. I do NOT see that there is one universal answer that suits all of humanity. At any rate that is the best that I can describe my solution to the question, and will be interested to hear the answer that best fits YOUR experiences. Interesting question to ponder, but NOT one to get hung up on. This illusion we call life is indeed finite and there is just too much other stuff happening every day that also begs for our attention.

I was wondering if anyone here believes in life after death? If so would you care to share why or why not?

This as you can see already camirae, is a complex question which has as many answers as people who read it.

I personally know there is a continuance when we leave this body, but would not limit what that is or could be with a definition. I think from my own experiences that it is different for each person.

I grew up with spiritualism as an accepted part of my upbringing, and seances, ouija boards, table liftings, and a myriad of similar occurrences, so it was not strange to me. My Grandfather was much like me, and he recognised some of my struggles with perceptions, and helped me with this. What was referred to in the family history as "gifts", did not always seem as such to me. My youngest sister and I shared some of these, and I taught her as I was taught.

I, among other things, am a "Deathwalker". It's not a bad thing, but not always welcome. I can see and sense life energy in people and animals, and when they die or are dying, I see the threads begin to unravel, detaching. I can and have walked part of the way towards the transition point, or the light if you prefer, with several people and many animals who are afraid to let go, as a comfort to not be all alone when that was needed. I can only go part of the way, or I too would transition.

I personally believe our conciousness, the essence, continues. I also believe how we continue is different for each being. Some come back again in another life, to finish learning what they need. Some are content, and move to another level of ascension. There are I believe many levels between.

When my grandmother passed, I was with her. She was 103, and had been without my grandfather for close to 50 years. The night before she passed, we knew she was failing. I spoke to my grandfather and told him she was weary now, and had waited a long time without him. She was the kindest, loving person I have ever known. I asked him if it was her time, to come for her and take her home.

The next day we were there when she woke, chipper and happy, and we had the best morning just talking and being together. She kept asking who the man was, standing in the corner. We did not see him, but I felt the presence, patient, loving. She also kept asking if she was "going home" today. I did not make the connection until later. After lunch, we stepped out a moment. My sister called us back as she was passing. I watched her let go of all the threads and release from the body. I closed my eyes as it was sad but beautiful. She was so peaceful. i then saw my grandfather and her walking through the tiger lillys she had planted at their mountain home 50+ years ago.

I still feel their presence at times.

The duty of a deathwalker was not discussed in my family, but it was always I who was given the job with our pets as we lived our lives. Nobody talked about it, but they knew I would see them safely over, and this is not an easy task for anyone.

When my mother passed, it was sudden, and she went into coma for days before. I sat with her the first day, and could still see her fighting inside, but the energy threads had started to come apart and I knew she would not return to this life. 2 days later, my father asked me to have the machines turned off. He had been there that night and could not bear to see her like that anymore. I could see when I walked in, that she was gone, and there was now only the shell, her spirit had moved on. I did as my father asked.

She looks in from time to time, but it was over a year before she did so.

My little sister, who shared many "gifts" with me was very close to me and visaversa. She suffered horribly with RA, and was bi-polar and subject to huge swings. I helped any way I could. She reached a point she gave up, and took her own life, leaving 3 children.

She was one spirit that did not come to visit, and has not. I believe when there is so much pain that making the decision to opt out becomes the action, there is a resting in stillness for as long as that soul needs, a time without the pain that drove them to that desperate action.

It's now been over ten years, and there are times now I think I feel her again. I hope she is happy and ready to move on again.

I could fill pages with these experiences, but you just need to know that there is more than this life, and not expect it to be defined or shown in any expected way. I am sorry for the difficult times, and to lose someone you love is never easy. Know it is not easy to not feel cheated somehow, when someone you love takes their own life. You must somehow forgive, even if you cannot understand.

When you let those people go on to where their light is guided, you can still feel and send love, and the forgiving is for your own healing..............................

Identification with the body is a choice. Perhaps we don't remember making that choice, because we are all conditioned from the earliest cognizant moments to see ourselves as separate in these bodies. We identify as we decide, and the tendency is to think what's believed about ourselves is what's true for others. Assumptions of all kinds are iffy at best. If we don't claim to know what we really don't, the truth of what is comes closer in a way. Of course, the truth of what is is never apart from us.

The discovery of truth is in the discernment of the false.
You can know what is not. What is - you can only be.
~Nisargadatta Maharaj

I was wondering if anyone here believes in life after death? If so would you care to share why or why not?

...

Just after i started laughing there was this horrid feeling of anger in the room almost MOVING,, toward ME. I looked direction of hallway cause it was almost like someone was there walking fast toward where i was in the kitchen. But i was alone... This was so strong that i said to my aunt "I have to go", and i ran out the house. Didn't even stop to lock the door behind me, i didn't care, i ran to my car and to the hotel i was staying at. After that i didn't go in and finish the job myself. I asked for help but didn't ever tell anyone why.

^^^ that is no proof of anything tho. Cause i didn't see anything whatever BUT it was as real as someone in person running at you while they are really pissed off, and i will never forget that feeling.

But i was wondering on other people's thoughts on this subject and why?

I was wondering if anyone here believes in life after death? If so would you care to share why or why not?

...

Just after i started laughing there was this horrid feeling of anger in the room almost MOVING,, toward ME. I looked direction of hallway cause it was almost like someone was there walking fast toward where i was in the kitchen. But i was alone... This was so strong that i said to my aunt "I have to go", and i ran out the house. Didn't even stop to lock the door behind me, i didn't care, i ran to my car and to the hotel i was staying at. After that i didn't go in and finish the job myself. I asked for help but didn't ever tell anyone why.

^^^ that is no proof of anything tho. Cause i didn't see anything whatever BUT it was as real as someone in person running at you while they are really pissed off, and i will never forget that feeling.

But i was wondering on other people's thoughts on this subject and why?

Thank you

Could you have been having a flashback?

No no flashback. I wasn't scared of my ex at all. I felt sorry for him. Seen continued contact as something to put up with because we had kids together. In fact most people treated him as something to put up with. I felt horrible about that. But he talked a lot and not great boundaries and didn't pick up on cues like most people, like when he overstayed a welcome and such.

... He wasn't a threatening person, just a sad person. His death was horrible and unfair and a lesson on suicide. As he shot himself with a .38 on his bed clearly, but didn;t aim right. 3 hours later his boss called the police because he was few hours late for work and the supervisor said he had a "bad feeling about it". The police found him alive by the front door on the floor (he had no phone). He died 11 hours later. But i never felt threatened by the guy. And he certainly did not deserve the death he got in any way, shape or form. But even that... we did not find out the details for well over a week by the time i had the house cleaned out. I could just tell basically where he shot himself, and where he nitially ended up on the floor as that was cut away by the time i got in to clean his belongings out.

Other than all that i really appreciate this feedback on here! Gives something more constructive to think about.

oh ok. .. well, no. it was from outside. I know it is hard to tell from cyberspace and all, but i am very much comfortable in my body. I am a present person. I don't tend toward disassociation much. I may have when i was maybe 16 and all.. but life goes on and i am not "young".

I am sure many, if i ever felt comfortable talking about it, WOULD say panic whatever. But i remember panic attacks from my youth. I know them from dealing with other having them in medical emergencies. No.

I was taking a break from packing everything for the storage unit, relaxing with a cigarette in the kitchen talking and laughing with my aunt on the phone. When it felt like someone stepped into the hallway who was really pissed off (i turned to look) and the "energy" started to give chase. But no one was there. But it was very real never the less.

There was some conflicting feelings on my part tho i was very aware of and that was some guilt. Not because of what happened, tho i felt terrible he felt he had to do such a thing. But that i in some way felt a relief initially after i got the news about an hour after he passed. I met the guy when i was very young. He was older. We had kids and then split not his fault or mine, we were just different people. He tended to hang onto my life, and family and even friends not because he was pining for me, but because he just was not able to form his own connections, and was very alone. This would become tiring sometimes, and sometimes feel intrusive

In this day and age he probably would have been diagnosed with Aspergers, but he grew up in a different time.

I was married, and divorced twice since he and broke up. It was difficult for men to understand "hey i like you but you have to know i also come with this 6ft 2 in guy who is like a stray but he is my kids father so i treat him like family because he has absolutely no one in the world".... after people met him they would understand the dilemma totally. .....So unfortunately i DID feel initially bad about feeling a decade old weight had been lifted with this guy.

I am explaining this in detail because i take my inquiry seriously. Is there life after death or not. I take my experience seriously. There are many dynamics in this that dont make it so easy for me to dismiss as "a woman having a panic attack". I worked as a paramedic for years before the death... i have seen some really harry scenes, so the house after the bio team had left so i could clean it out of his belongings, was really rather tame in my estimation for a traumatic event location. I was just feeling like i was doing my job as his kids mother, i felt i was doing the right thing. And he just had no one else that could do it.

I once heard someone in the position of a spiritual master asked the question, "what happens after we die?" His reply was, "die, and find out."

Can we be content living with it as a mystery? We can have ideas about it, but truly, in any mental terms, can it be known? We don't even know if death is the same for each and every expression of human consciousness. What we see outside of ourselves cannot be known as more than an impression of the senses, and some range of conclusions we might draw. What will a fruitless inquiry do for us, if that is what it is to be? The better inquiry might be, who, and what, am I? Be kind to yourself, this experience of not knowing can be pretty difficult, depending on our demands.

Unfortunately there is no evidence that would support any connection between life as we know it, and an afterlife.

There is however a relationship between what we once experienced and the hole left by an element that is now missing because of a death.

When we are accustomed to one thing we do notice when it is missing and sometimes feel that this indicates it's presence as an afterimage, but this is within us and is not an actual additional input. It is simply conspicuous by it's absence.

I once heard someone in the position of a spiritual master asked the question, "what happens after we die?" His reply was, "die, and find out."

Can we be content living with it as a mystery? We can have ideas about it, but truly, in any mental terms, can it be known? We don't even know if death is the same for each and every expression of human consciousness. What we see outside of ourselves cannot be known as more than an impression of the senses, and some range of conclusions we might draw. What will a fruitless inquiry do for us, if that is what it is to be? The better inquiry might be, who, and what, am I? Be kind to yourself, this experience of not knowing can be pretty difficult, depending on our demands.

I am sorry (not for myself, but anyone reading this who may be having the same struggle) that this is considered a "fruitless inquiry".

I was always taught that if i didn't know something and wish to find out more about it, to hear different perspectives. And if one wishes to know then not to assume, but ask.

Unfortunately there is no evidence that would support any connection between life as we know it, and an afterlife.

There is however a relationship between what we once experienced and the hole left by an element that is now missing because of a death.

When we are accustomed to one thing we do notice when it is missing and sometimes feel that this indicates it's presence as an afterimage, but this is within us and is not an actual additional input. It is simply conspicuous by it's absence.

Thank you but i don't expect to find, like, evidence here because i know this is abstract. I was looking for different perspectives to jump start my thinking in new directions rather than trying to struggle with my old paradigm. If that makes sense? So I care much about how others view these things. Not so i can agree..... but Think :)

There is most certainly some sort of after life. My wife and I have had spirits around us most of our lives, and have become so accustomed to it that we are not even surprised if something suddenly decides to move by itself. I am not a believer in the concept of Heaven nor Hell, but I know some part of our essence goes on. Not sure how it all works and won't assume to try to explain it, but we have had so many experiences that I could sit here all day typing and not even graze the surface. I have toyed with the idea of writing a book about it, but without embellishing the experiences most were rather mundane and I think it would not be all that interesting.

My wife has what some would consider "gifts" and has relayed messages from folks who recently had passed that were much appreciated and shocking to the recipients when she told them. She is always hesitant to do so, but says she doesn't feel she has the right to refuse if the spirit comes to her repeatedly or with a sense of urgency. My wife does not pursue these gifts and considers them to be a burden of sorts. Regardless she has them and acts on them when needed. I know some people who find no evidence to support this, that simply do not believe when others tell them of these things. That is ok too, as I was once a non believer of anything. I didn't believe in anything I could not hold in my hand and look at. It took a while for my perceptions to change and for me to admit these things, but when a vase flies across the room at your wife's head from a shelf it was sitting on, you either have to admit you are mentally ill and need medication, or that there is some sort of spirit motivating that vase. I prefer the latter.

I say anyone who doubts an afterlife should spend a bit of time with their local paranormal group doing some amateur ghost hunting. It won't take long before you have a whole different perspective on an afterlife of some sort. Life is ever so much more than meets the eye.

I say anyone who doubts an afterlife should spend a bit of time with their local paranormal group doing some amateur ghost hunting. It won't take long before you have a whole different perspective on an afterlife of some sort. Life is ever so much more than meets the eye.

Spring has come back every year that I have been alive and almost everything on the surface has in fact died.............still the essence lives on............

I will seek toward continuance in whatever form that may or may not be..............I am content, in fact motivated, to seek the mysteries........

But today I'll just try to be cool and mostly positive to the things around me..........as best as I can...........

No one knows "the answer" because there is no single answer....we don't even know if blue is the same to each other just agree that it is.........

Personally I perceive an incredible amount of information and sensations from the environment around me. I hesitate to label them as this or that in an effort not to pretend that I know what it is........

I encourage all of you to spend a full night out in the wilderness, away from our electrified grids and endless distractions...... especially if you can find an old cemetery, ancient stone circle, temple, or burial mound.................and do so completely sober, completely unmedicated, and fully attentive, afterwards you tell me how much you know of it all..............................go and meditate at the Gettysburg battlefield and surrounding area's.

I perceive spirit everywhere, I "feel" it, I "sense" it, I "hear" it, sometimes "taste" it and still it's just a label like the color "blue".............

Most of us would do well to worry more about life during life, not of our own but more of others, than the afterwards..............IMHO

These are just my thoughts and current responses evoked by reading and contemplating your question................they will probably be different later today...............